Many of us want to hatch chicks, but how should we do it? A broody hen, or an incubator? Below are some of the aspects you should take into consideration when making this decision.

Obtaining

It’s fairly easy to obtain an incubator. You can find them at local feed stores, online, and you can even make your own. Broody hens on the other hand, may be harder to come by. Many production breeds have had the ‘broody gene’ bred out of them. This is because when a hen is broody, she is not producing eggs. In order for hens to produce as many as possible, scientists have bred this natural instinct out of them through artificial selection. Breeds that weren’t bred for production such as cochins, silkies, and old English games still go broody. In fact, out of my 22 cochin hens, 20 of them went broody this spring. So if you’d like to use a broody hen, it would be wise to own a couple of hens from breeds that weren’t bred for production.

Time of the Year

Time of the year is a huge aspect. Broody hens will usually only go broody in the spring and early to mid summer which means you can only hatch in the spring and early to mid summer. If you’d like to hatch year round like I do, the better choice may be the incubator. Incubators are to be used indoors only in order to keep a stable temperature, because of this; it will make no difference whether you incubate in the summer or the winter. Another thing to consider with timing is that you can’t force a hen to become broody. When she becomes broody is up to her and may not be at your convenience. The incubator on the other hand can be pulled out whenever you’d like.

Collecting Eggs

Collecting eggs is similar for both broody hens and incubators, though you don’t have to collect for a broody. Broody hens can create their own nests with their own eggs to sit on, but usually we would like them to sit on specific eggs. You should select the eggs from proven, healthy breeders that are fed a well balanced diet. Eggs should be collected 3 times a day to avoid excessively heating or cooling. Avoid eggs that are excessively large or small. You should also avoid eggs that are excessively dirty. If collecting for a broody hen, don’t wash the eggs, but if you are collecting for an incubator, you have the choice. There are many debates on whether or not to wash the eggs and from my own experience, it doesn’t matter. The hatch rate of the washed eggs was just as high as the unwashed eggs in my incubator. If you do decide to wash them, always use water warmer than the eggs and scrub very gently so that you don’t push bacteria deeper into the pores of the eggs.

Storing Eggs

Storing eggs is the same for broody hens and incubators, though once again, you don’t have to store a broody hen’s eggs because she is capable of creating her own nest. For storing, the eggs should be kept around 55 – 65 degrees in an area with no drafts. A good place to keep them is in a basement. Never put them in front of a window or anywhere that can heat up. Eggs should also be tilted daily while in storage to prevent the yolk from sticking to the side of the egg. Simply place a block of some sort under one side of the carton, and then move it to the other side the following day. Humidity should be kept around 75% during storage. Humidity levels aren't that important, but it shouldn’t be too dry. You should also keep in mind that eggs can’t be stored forever. Their hatchability starts to decline after 7 days, though I’ve seen great hatch rates of eggs up to 14 days old. Before adding them to an incubator or giving them to a broody, make sure they are warmed up to room temperature to avoid excessive condensation.

Number of Eggs

A broody hen can only hatch the eggs that will fit underneath of her while an incubator can hold any number of eggs. The number of eggs a hen can fit underneath of her depends on how big the eggs are and how big the hen is. The average amount is around 8 eggs. Another thing to remember when giving a broody hen eggs, is that the more eggs there are, the higher the risk of eggs being broken and not being fully covered. Incubators can be purchased or created to hold any number of eggs. Some incubators were created to only hold 2 eggs while others can hold thousands. It’s your choice when it comes to an incubator.

Sterilizing

Incubators and broody hens both need to be kept clean, but in very different ways. A broody hen should have fresh clean bedding, water, and food. When they are broody, they are very susceptible to disease so you’ll need to watch her health. The hens should be periodically checked for mites and lice as they can kill a broody hen in her weakened state. Incubators need to be kept in pristine condition as they are the perfect place for bacterial growth. They need to be sterilized after a hatch, and before setting them up again. How you sterilize depends on what your incubator is made of. For my styrofoam hova bators, I use a solution of bleach water. Do some research on how to clean an incubator before you buy one.

Setting Up

A broody hen should be set up away from other chickens in a pristine environment. She should be protected from predators and it should be an area large enough for her to stretch and relieve herself. Incubators need to be set up days before adding eggs to insure a correct and stable temperature. They should be set up in a room with constant temperatures and away from windows, vents, or anything else that could influence the temperature. Set up incubators according to the instructions that came with them. Give them adequate time to heat up before making any adjustments. Give them at least 2 hours after an adjustment before making additional adjustments. Some incubators take a lot of adjustment before they are correct so prepare a couple days in advance.

Temperature

When using a broody hen, you don’t have to worry about temperature. She will pluck feathers from her underside and keep the eggs warm with her own body heat. If you’re using an incubator, however, correct temperature will make or break your hatch. Forced air incubators need to be kept at a constant 99.5 degrees Fahrenheit while still air incubators need to be kept at 101 – 102 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperatures should be measured at the top of the eggs because that is where the embryos develop. Even a 1 degree difference will greatly affect your hatch, so it’s important that you make sure your thermometer is accurate. Many thermometers are off by as much as 10 degrees so you should compare multiple thermometers and calibrate them to insure accuracy. If temperatures are kept a bit too warm, chicks will hatch early and be at risk for deformities. If temperatures are kept a bit too cool, chicks will hatch late and be at risk for deformities. Another thing to watch for is fluctuation in temperatures. Try to keep fluctuations within 1 degree.

Humidity

When using a broody hen, you will not need to worry about humidity. The hen will naturally keep the eggs at the correct level. When using an incubator, humidity needs to be controlled. Incorrect humidity is often the cause of a failed hatch because humidity tends to be overlooked. If the humidity is too high, air cells will be undeveloped resulting in drowned chicks at the time of hatch. If the humidity is too low, air cells are overly developed resulting in chicks being unable to get into hatching position and if they are unable to get into the correct position, they often times suffocate in the shell. Humidity is released according to surface area. To increase humidity, increase the surface area of the water. To decrease humidity, decrease the surface area of the water. Raising or lowering depth won’t affect the humidity levels. Humidity is measured with a hygrometer. The most commonly recommended percentages are 50% humidity for the first 18 days of development, and 65% for the last 3 but there are other recommendations including dry incubation which confuse many people. The truth is, the correct humidity is different for everyone. It depends on where you live, the season, and many other factors. To figure out what humidity the eggs should be at, use an air cell chart or a scale. Air cell charts are used commonly and can be found on google images. Compare air cell sizes on days 7, 14, and 18 to the chart. If air cells are too large, increase the humidity. If they are too small, decrease the humidity. And of course, if they are correct, leave the humidity be. You can do the same thing by tracking the mass of an egg. An egg needs to lose a certain percentage of its mass before hatching.

Egg turning

A broody hen will naturally turn her eggs many times throughout the day for the first 18 days, but when using an incubator, you are in charge of turning them. Eggs should be turned 3 times a day for the first 18 days of incubation. They are turned so that the embryo doesn’t stick to the shell. Unturned eggs risk deformities. You can either purchase an automatic egg turner, or you can turn the eggs manually. Automatic turners will turn the eggs for you, but can be expensive. If you’d like to manually turn your eggs, you should mark them with an X on one side and a 0 on the other with pencil. This way you know which way to turn the eggs during each turning session. Turning should be done in fairly equal intervals so if you are going to turn them 3 times a day, you should turn them every 8 hours. You must stop turning the eggs on day 18 so that the chicks can get into hatching position. If you continue turning, they could become disorientated.

Ventilation

When using a broody hen, you won’t have to worry about ventilation; the hen will take care of it herself. When using an incubator, you must be sure to have proper ventilation. If you purchased your incubator, most likely it’s already ventilated, though if you made your own incubator, you must provide adequate ventilation. Don’t overly ventilate as it will be hard to create a stable temperature and humidity, but embryos could suffocate if there is too little. To ventilate, simply put holes near the bottom of the incubator as well as the top. Heat rises, so warm air will flow through the top holes while at the same time drawing fresh air from the bottom holes.

Risks of a Broody Hen

There are some risks involved with broody hens. Hens will sometimes abandon their nests for no apparent reason. The eggs are left in the cold to slowly die which can be quite frustrating for the owner. Hens also sometimes break their eggs. They aren’t very gentle with the eggs and no matter how much bedding is in their nesting box, eggs may break. To help prevent eggs from breaking, keep the bedding full and don’t let her have too many eggs. Another possibility is the hen pooping on her eggs. The poop will block the eggs' pores and increase the chances of bacteria invading. Also, rotten eggs tend to go unnoticed. If left unattended, they will explode all over the hen and the other eggs from the buildup of gases. If this happens, first change the bedding material, then quickly wash the eggs (they are covered in bad bacteria), and then bathe the hen. You will have to blow dry her very well so that she can keep her eggs warm and you must do this very quickly so that the eggs don’t sit out for too long. I have done this before and received a 100% hatch rate (except the egg that exploded).

Risks of an Incubator

Since incubators are usually run on electricity, power outages are a common problem. If this happens, heat some water in water bottles and place them in the incubator. You can also cover the incubator with a blanket to help hold in its heat. Other risks include human errors such as forgetting to turn, or incorrect temperatures and humidity.

Here's a quick summary:

Broody Hen Pros

You don’t need to collect and store eggs.

You don’t have to monitor temperature or humidity.

You don’t have to worry about eggs being turned or proper ventilation.

You don’t have to worry about power outages.

Broody Hen Cons

Some hens won’t ever go broody.

You can’t force a hen to go Broody.

Can only be used in the spring and summer (whenever she decides to go broody)

Limited number of eggs to be hatched.

Requires a clean area away from the other chickens.

Hens may abandon their nest.

Hens may poop on their nest.

Hens may break their eggs.

Rotten eggs have a tendency to go unnoticed.

Incubator Pros

Easy to obtain.

Can be used any time of the year.

Can hatch any number of eggs.

Incubator Cons

You must collect and store eggs yourself.

You must monitor temperature and humidity,

You have to turn eggs and ensure proper ventilation.

Power outages can be devastating.

Lots of room for human error.

As you can see, there are advantages and disadvantages to both. If you would like a few chicks in the spring, you may want to use a broody while if you’d like to hatch large numbers year round, you’ll probably want to use an incubator. This information is only to make you aware of the different aspects between the two. Once you make your decision, be sure to do further research.

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I would get rid of the partially hatched egg, as it will rot and ruin the other eggs in the nest. If the other eggs are good and they are all different ages, you will probably have to remove the chicks as they hatch and raise them by hand, or they will starve. Under normal circumstances, the eggs would have all started the brooding process the same day and thus the chicks would have all developed at the same rate and would therefore hatch within hours of each other, and once all that are going to hatch have hatched and dried (24 to 48 hrs), the mother then leaves the nest (and possibly an egg or a couple of eggs that weren't viable) . But if there are lots of eggs of different ages, she won't know to do that and the first (oldest) chicks will not be taken off the nest to eat and drink and will die or be crushed..

I've done it both ways a lot. Another advantage of an incubator is that all of your chicks will be one age group and can be raised in a predator-proof, escape-proof area with chick-sized waterers and feeders (which adult birds quickly empty, overturn, or foul) and you can feed them age-appropriate feed (which contains more protein than adult birds need or should get). Chicks can get through fences that will contain adult birds. But it is very enjoyable to watch a mother hen with her chicks!

I've always used an incubator, but one of our hens (only one part bantom) went broody, so we got her some eggs to sit on to see how she goes =) This article helps! I'll have to keep an eye on the eggs to make sure they aren't rotten and explode!

Good article! I use to have banty hens that would be depressed if they could not brood. I have an affinity for Black Sex Link hens lately and they do not brood but, they sure do lay eggs like crazy! The are the best layers I have ever had! I am trying some Red Sex Links and see if they lay as good as their black sisters.

Great job, though you may want to put in some hens just want to HATCH eggs. We had a hen who abandoned her chick because she wanted hatched eggs, and we had the same hen go broody again so we put her in an egg-less nest and when our (already) ordered chicks came, and 5 seconds after being with them she was done, lol

I can not say enough good things about having a broody hen. We had to do nothing, except keep food and water close by. We have had 3 hens go broody (one currently) and out of 13 eggs (from 2 mamas sitting) we have had 7 hatch! A pretty dang good number. We have not had to really worry about a thing. The mamas totally took over, protected them, thought them how to do everything and there is NOTHING BETTER than watching a mama raise her babies! Us humans totally get in the way!

We will see how our little bantam mama does- she is sitting on 8 right now, and we only only have one real "mating" rooster for our 25 hens. He is a bantam and they are pretty much all standard size aside from 2 bantam hens! lol... I am not holding out much hope! But we will see....

Fantastic article ! Thanks so much for taking the time to write it. I have eggs on order and this will be my first hatch. I am printing your article and keeping it by the incubator to help insure I do everything correctly. Thanks again ! (^V^)

Good article, very balanced look at both options
I used 3 broody hens to hatch our chicks. And the hens decided to go into cluck in late Sept so they hatched in Oct. The first hen only seemed to want to sit on the eggs, she was very gentle and attentive. But when the chicks hatched she didn't seem to want to care for them. Thankfully we had another hen also in cluck on her own clutch of eggs. And when she saw the baby chick she took it. So we gave the chicks to her and the eggs she had been on to the first hen.
Then there was hen number 3 who turned out to be the perfect little mother. She not only raised her own eggs to hatch but took over all 10 chicks when the other hen decided she was tired of it.
I know that there was much less stress on my end knowing the hen was there to care for the eggs and chicks once they hatched. I didn't have to worry about the power going out or the heat lamp failing. (being that it was in october i would have been in constant worry had those little chicks been without a mama to watch over them.
This was my first time hatching and I will always use a hen. The way the hen and chick act together is something that cannot be described only enjoyed and amazed at.

great article. Believe it or not, I actually had two white leghorn hens go broody last summer, none of the eggs under them hatched, I only had a silkie roo and a very young roo, the silkie had a hard time mounting the leghorns.

Since I didn't have a hen at the moment which was broody and since the weather in Ohio is so wild right now, I chose to spend $35 for an incubator. Nothing fancy, added 2 more thermometers and love checking on the eggs. I add eggs daily and each is numbered all around them with 1-4...when a new egg is added, it gets placed with whichever number all of the other eggs are sided up. I try to turn them at least 6 times/day and sometimes even wake up during the night and turn them. If any of them hatch the first ones should be around April 8. Stopped at 30 eggs...enough to try for the first time.

I can definately see how incubators are better for chickens. I only raise peafowl and decided to just let my peahens hatch out their own chicks. I don't need to hatch out tons of chicks so I just let my peahens do it. I worry too much when I am the one monitoring the eggs, and last year my chicks took too long to hatch and many had foot problems and that was hard to get them to keep their shoes on so I decided using the peahens will save me a lot of messed up peachicks. The peahens take such good care of their chicks too. The dissadvantage I am finding though is a clutch can be up to six eggs. My peahens are good at hatching all of their eggs so if I want to let them hatch and raise their chicks, I would need a pen large enough for a peahen, a peacock, and a max of six peachicks. That is a lot of space that I wouldn't need if I was just taking the eggs and hatching them myself, also I have to add smaller fencing around the pen because last year some chicks would go through the fence and get eaten by a hawk or something. It is hard deciding what to do. I think I will do a bit of both, with the majority of the eggs being left in the peahen's care. I would like to hatch maybe one a year just so that I can have a really friendly bird. That is a pro for incubators, your chicks will imprint to you.

Good info in this article! I use both broodies and an incubator, but I think I prefer the broody method. I love to listen to the entirely new range of noises broody hens make, and they're fascinating to watch raise their chicks. I'm fortunate in that I've never really been without a broody hen. Out of the 50 or so I have, three of them are broody on a clutch right now, even though it's the middle of winter!

Sounds like a neat system! Oddly enough, one of the best broody hens I ever had, bar none, was a black star (black sex-link)! Which is of course a breed that isn't even supposed to go broody! Where I raise chickens primarily for a hobby (although we do use the eggs and give the excess to church) and not for production (my wife can't stand the idea of slaughtering something that I raised), I tend to buy pullet chicks when I need replacements so I don't have a lot of roosters to deal with, but every once in a while I can't resist bringing off a batch of chicks! And I like to have one or two roosters around anyway because my birds are free range and they help look out for the hawks. Roosters do tend to stand watch over the flock and sound the alarm when a hawk appears, causing the hens to run for cover...of course this isn't fool-proof and one shouldn't totally rely on it but it does help.

I have to add- all of the broody hens I've used have a 90% or better hatch rate, which is a lot better than an incubator. I use both an incubator and broody hens- when my hens start setting (Usually several hens at a time), I set a partial batch of eggs under each one with the date written in permanent marker, then a week later I set another partial batch batch, and so forth, then take the chicks as soon as they are hatched- this way I can hatch chicks under the SAME broodies for at least 2 months. I just have to make sure each hen is still in good weight and looking/acting healthy- if one looks like it's affecting her poorly, I break her from setting. I can get a LOT of chicks this way, with very little effort.

I agree on everyting you said. I much more enjoy Mama raising her young. We have done it in the garage and after a few weeks, the dust, etc. gets old. Also, the other birds in the flock seem to accept the babies easier with Mama there watching out for them. There is always less drama.

Neat article! I've done it both ways and I agree, there are pros and cons to both ways, just like you said. But I do enjoy watching a hen with her chicks! I'd be inclined to go with a broody breed for waterfowl, though. Duck eggs are a lot harder to hatch in a hand turning hova-bator than chicken eggs. It's hard to do the turning often enough. An automatic turner would work better. I had a Sportsman Redwood incubator (fully automatic) and got great hatches of any species in it, but it was very expensive to run.

I agree. I love watching a broody hen do her thing and it's so much easier to let her do the incubating and then raise them, but I think that I prefer incubating with an incubator. You see the pros, but also, I find that the chicks are friendlier. I play with them daily and they run up to me, but when they have a true mother, they want nothing to do with me. I think I'll add a section on raising the chicks when I find the time. You can incubate chicks and have a hen raise them or have a hen incubate them and artificially brood them, but I feel it's a bit cruel to take chicks away from a mother hen. Thanks for the compliments!

I've let one of my Buff Orphington sit on eggs twice last year. Out of 8 eggs each time, only one each time hatched out to survive. But watching mama and the one baby interact is precious and priceless! Definitely a lot easier to let mama raise 'em.